


The memory of time long-past

by MissQED



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! - All Media Types, Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D's, Yu-Gi-Oh! GX, Yu-Gi-Oh! VRAINS
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Compliant, Judai and Yusei are not responsible for these messes, Light Angst, Lost Incident, M/M, Post-Canon, Ryoken has major GuiltTM issues, Time Travel, Time Travel Shenanigans, Yusaku gets angry for once
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-18
Updated: 2020-02-18
Packaged: 2021-02-28 03:15:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,337
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22787026
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissQED/pseuds/MissQED
Summary: Ryoken and Yusaku are transported ten years in the past, because Fate is a shipper, and Judai and Yusei are her minions for the day to avoid any more of her meddling with their love story.Self-indulgent fic, because I'm in that type of mood.
Relationships: Fudou Yuusei/Yuuki Juudai | Jaden Yuki, Fujiki Yuusaku/Revolver | Kougami Ryouken, implied
Comments: 6
Kudos: 65





	The memory of time long-past

**Author's Note:**

> Happy birthday to me ~! I was wondering what I wanted to do for my birthday, so I decided to write a totally self-indulgent fic because A) sharing is caring and B) I don't care all that much for receiving presents but I love giving them.
> 
> Enjoy! Also find me on [Tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/projectemmatyler), I post things there once in a blue moon when my drawing muse strikes me and answer questions!
> 
> Inspired by an a-maz-ing drawing by [ZakuraRain](https://zakurarain.tumblr.com/) for Datastorm December that I unfortunately missed, but who cares!

Ryoken did not, as a rule of thumb, believe in magic. One, it was illogical – making things happen just because you wanted them to happen was just too good to be true. Two, there was no known consistent proof for any such things. Even Yus – _Playmaker_ ’s Link Sense could be explained as a mere sixth sense, an extra sensory input that could be reliably tested and proven or disproven (very heavily proven, as his and Ryoken’s continued existence showed). Third, if it existed, the various recording devices that seemingly everyone today possessed would’ve captured _something_ sooner or later, right?

Wrong, apparently, as he stared at his white-gloved arms, all too aware of the helmet laying heavily on his scalp and light biker’s vizor distorting his vision lightly – all the sensations he had learned to associate with his presence in Link VRAINS and _not_ the real world. The world Kogami Ryoken lived in was mostly free of the presence of virtual reality, surrounded by Spectre’s carefully maintained garden, sea breeze and gigantic moon creating Stardust Road; save his self-appointed job of liasoning with SOL and Zaizen Akira and making sure no more Hanoi Projects and no more Ignises would ever threaten the world, Ryoken and Revolver’s lives did not intersect anymore.

This fact only served to highlight the uneasy feeling he couldn’t shake ever since he woke up that morning in the mansion three hours later than normal, fully decked in his VRAINS regalia and sporting all the accessories of his Revolver avatar, laying in the bed too small for his current eighteen-year-old body. The room was certainly his, the carefully selected books on the shelves and framed pictures a definite confirmation, but Ryoken couldn’t shake the feeling of _wrongness_ that continued to plague him.

Finally having enough of running himself into a circle, Ryoken climbed out of the too-small bed and went out of the room. The mansion was unsurprisingly quiet – even at its fullest, the place only hosted six people, one of which was his comatose father, so it really was only five people that could make significant noise. Making a beeline for the nearest computer, Ryoken’s eyes nearly fell out of their sockets when he was denied the access.

_Wrong password_? What kind of sick joke was that? He was not so addled in the head to forget his own goddamn password, so why was the computer denying him entry? Did Spectre decide to play a prank on him? He had been talking a lot recently with Blue Maiden and Soulburner, and heavens know they weren’t above pranking him in such a childish way… After several more tries that ended with the same error message, Ryoken gave up and stalked off to the living room – the room with the easiest access to the Spectre’s garden and the likeliest place he’d hide in after pulling such nonsense like changing the password on their computers.

He never made it to the garden, however – the opened newspapers on the couch Ryoken could distinctly remember throwing out to make place for Father’s life support grabbed his attention and made him freeze.

“Impossible...” Ryoken gently picked up the papers, afraid to touch them. The date and the year… oh, Ryoken could remember that day and year all too well. Tortured himself to the point of remembering the year, month, day and exact time on the clock, because this was the day – the day when he had helped his Father grab the final, sixth experiment subject for Ignis research. The day Kogami Ryoken met Fujiki Yusaku, and subsequently chained them together so tightly they became prisoners of destiny they tried later so hard to change.

But this couldn’t be. Time-travel by itself was almost impossible due to the entropy law – the constant rise of chaos in the universe that guaranteed time could only flow in one direction, because it was impossible to decrease chaos – and time-travel to the point in time where a person existed already would create so many paradoxes it’d most likely shatter an entire timeline, although that was all pure conjecture seeing as _no one had successfully time-traveled yet._

“Hello, is anyone home?” A deep male voice echoed through the mansion, and Ryoken froze. It didn’t sound like anyone Ryoken had ever met, and he knew the voices of everyone even remotely connected to his Father and Hanoi, but it still sent his heart into a sprint.

“Maybe they’ve gone out?” Another male voice asked with a slight worry, sounding both older and younger than the first voice.

“I didn’t see anyone, and Stardust says he’s still somewhere here,” the first voice replied, and now Ryoken knew he was in deep trouble – the two voices and this Stardust (probably a codename or an avatar) were definitely looking for him specifically. “Hello?”

“No need to be scared, we just want to help you!” The second voice piped up, now cheery and bubbly like a hyperactive teenager. “Seriously, Mr. Time-traveler, you don’t need to be scared of us – we’re here to get you back.”

Time-traveler – the voice knew something he didn’t. Swallowing, Ryoken walked up to the room doors and cracked them open, just enough to catch a look of the intruders in his not-home. There were two of them, like their voices had suggested - one of them in his late twenties and taller, with black hair with some interesting spikes to the side that reminded Ryoke uncomfortably of himself, dark blue and brown riding gear, golden highlights and a golden tattoo on his face, and the other slightly younger, brown-haired, dressed in what looked like red school uniform and carrying a sack-like backpack over his shoulder that was – moving?

“Pharaoh!” the brown-haired man said in a scolding tone, dropping the sack to reveal a fat tabby cat peeking out of it with scrunched face. “Honestly, can’t you for once stay at home when I go traipsing around?”

“You’d complain of boredom and lack of anything to pet if Pharaoh did so, Judai,” the dark-haired man shook his head, the impassive look on his face betrayed by the fondness in his voice. Now, Ryoken was starting to get freaked out by him – not only did he have a similar hairstyle, he also had a voice that reminded him of himself! The only upside was the facial expressions – or the lack thereof: this man could easily pass as Yusak – _Playmaker_ ’s twin with how emotionless he seemed to be. “Besides, that’d leave you alone with Yubel’s nagging and Johan’s pestering.”

“I hate you, Yusei,” came the brown-haired man’s – Judai’s, and wasn’t that name appropriate for how petulant and childish he sounded, Ryoken thought to himself – pouty reply. “Why are you always right?”

“I’m not always right -” Yusei defended himself with a small smile.

“Bah, you’re right every time when it counts,” Judai waved it off before turning to Ryoken, eyes glittering. “Hey, Mr. Time-traveler. Nice sytle, gotta say – the bullet earrings are perfect, I wish I could pull off something like that – bu you do know you shouldn’t be here?”

“If the newspaper didn’t clue me in, your loud discussion certainly did,” Ryoken crossed his arms and sent a withering glare at Judai, the one he used to intimidate his more unruly members and ignoring the compliments towards his avatar’s design. It wouldn’t do to reveal any more of his weaknesses, not when he was the one in the position of having to ask for help. “I would appreciate if you could return me home immediately, as I didn’t want this to happen.”

“Ah, man, no need for the scary glare!” Despite his words, Judai did not seem at all bothered or intimidated by the glare, which grated a little on Ryoken’s pride. He was _Revolver_ , the man who led an entire illegal hackers’ organization at the age of thirteen, and now he couldn’t even intimidate this airheaded man-child? “And trust me, I really want to pack you onto Yusei’s D-Wheel and let him take you back – because maintaining time loops is a bitch, I did not sign up for this when I agreed to become Herald… actually I never I saw the contract - ”

“Judai,” Yusei said in monotone, and Judai giggled, making Ryoken raise his eyebrows. Their relationship was certainly an odd one – one stoic and collected, the other free-spirited and careless – so how did they work together? A voice that sounded disturbingly like Dark Ignis giggled and asked to keep notes for his own possible -

_Shut up!_

“I’m rambling again, aren’t I? Okay, back on topic of accidental time-travel – if you’re really telling the truth...” and here Judai stopped to send Ryoken a glare, and Ryoken had to fight the urge to step back. This was no airhead fool, it dawned on him as he stared down a face that Ryoken only used to see on the victims of Lost Incident ( _the face he saw on Playmaker,_ his mind corrected him quietly, and for once he did not stamp out the thought immediately); this was a person who had been broken one time too many to be considered entirely sane, a soldier who never quite left his battlefield in his mind. “If you’re telling the truth, then there must’ve been some higher powers who wanted you here, at this moment. That, or magic.”

Hysteria bubbled up inside Ryoken’s chest, rising up until it burst into a fit of laughter, far too high-pitched and breathy to be considered joy or amusement. To their credit, Yusei and Judai almost instantly noticed there was something wrong with him, and moved closer to him, though never quite approaching him or crowding him, for which Ryoken was eternally grateful.

“Magic’s not real,” Ryoken choked out through his hysteria-induced fit.

“Boy do I wish that was the truth,” Judai chuckled darkly at his own words. “But the fact remains you appear to be here for some reason – Yusei, please remind me to talk to Chronograph about his, because if anyone of his did this, I will go on a strangling spree, and Yubel will help me.”

“Judai,” was Yusei’s only reply, filled with exasperation and affection, and Ryoken’s heart clenched at the intonation. He remembered very little of his mother – she had died far too early for him to make any notable memories – but he always imagined his parents to have this type of relationship, and quietly wished it for himself down the line, when the world stopped resting as much on his shoulder and when he finally managed to deal with his own demons.

In his musings, he missed part of the conversation between Judai and Yusei, but he certainly did not miss Judai’s sudden stiffening, nor Yusei’s instant reaction to it – placing an arm on Judai’s shoulder and turning him around until they were facing each other.

“What is it?” Yusei asked what was on Ryoken’s mind.

“Someone else just appeared nearby,” Judai hissed, batting away Yusei’s hand and turning back to Ryoken. “Seems like you just got a partner, Mr. Time-traveler.”

“I do have a name,” Ryoken breathed, suddenly feeling nervous. Someone else also appearing, on the same day his younger self and Fujiki Yusaku met… it could be a coincidence, but Ryoken had long since stopped believing in them, not after seeing Dark Ignis reunite with his Origin, and not after the revelation Fujiki Yusaku, the child that prompted him to report his own father, and Playmaker were one and the same.

It had to be _him_.

“And I think I know who it might be if it’s from my timeline.”

“That would make my and Judai’s lives easier,” Yusei said quietly, stepping closer for the first time and speaking to Ryoken. “How do we call you? I’m Fudo Yusei, this is Yuki Judai.”

Ryoken’s heart skipped a beat, and he promptly had to regulate his breathing the moment the names left Yusei’s mouth. Yusei-damned-Fudo? Son of Fudo Shun, the inventor of Momentum, and the head of Fortune project which helped revolutionize the way energy was made and distributed in Japan?

“I-I’m Kogami Ryoken,” he somehow stuttered out, still trying _not_ to freak out and fanboy all over his idol and the man whose ace card shared the name of the very street the house they were in was. “I-it’s a pleasure to meet you, sir.”

“You got yourself a fanboy, Yusei,” Judai snickered, but Ryoken didn’t care. He got to meet _the_ Fudo Yusei! “Also, is Yubel lying to me, or is this street named Stardust Road?”

“I-it is, for the natural phenomenon that occurs here,” Ryoken flailed a little, trying to explain to Yusei the coincidence. “The bioluminescent plankton gather and under the moonlight it glows like a silver road.”

Yusei hummed, a little smile appearing again on his face as he briefly touched a pouch on his waist – the real card holster, Ryoken realized with a jolt, the kind that became almost obsolete with the new generations of the Duel Disks, unless you were like Playmaker who insisted on card-insertion disks.

“I see, but I think we had enough of dallying – we should find that partner of yours and figure out why are even here.”

“Yes, please,” Ryoken instantly agreed, eager to get out of the house and away from the reminders of the past, even though it’d most likely mean running straight to the grown-up version of said past – but at least Playmaker was familiar in ways Fujiki Yusaku never was and likely never will.

* * *

“Hey man – Ryoken – I forgot to ask you, but what’s with the outfit?” Judai asked after a few minutes of wandering around the downtown Den City, trying to pinpoint the loction of the second traveler. They had gotten some strange looks over Yusei’s riding gear and Ryoken’s avatar outfit, but no one commented.

“My Link VRAINS avatar,” Ryoken explained, and seeing the confused looks on his companions’ faces, elaborated, secretly thrilled to be the one teaching Fudo Yusei anything. “Dueling is rarely done in real world nowadays – everything happens in VRAINS, which stands for Virtual Reality Artificial Intelligence Network System.”

“Oh,” Yusei nodded with a thoughtful look. “I’m assuming it’s like a video game, but with VR headset that allows total immersion?”

“Essentially,” Ryoken nodded, happy that Yusei got it quickly despite the difference in terminology and technology advancements between their time periods. “Although VR sets have actually been phased out in favor of devices that can support VR throughout your whole body while you remain totally motionless – also, it often behaves like a social network because it’s connected to the wider network, but for Duelists only.”

“Whoa, that sounds amazing!” Judai butted in, eyes wide. “That kind of eliminates the need for Pro Duelist circuits, right?”

“Sort of,” Ryoken replied after a few seconds of trying to remember that yes, Pro Duelist circuits were a thing for both Judai and Yusei. “There are Charisma Duelists – the ones that do it for popularity and sponsorships – but more often than not they lead private life outside VRAINS.”

“The advantage of the avatar,” Yusei noted and Ryoken smiled bitterly. He still had a love-hate relationship with the concept of avatars. On one hand, it allowed him privacy and safety, but on the other hand, it stopped him from realizing who Playmaker was until it was nearly too late.

“Also its biggest disadvantage – unless you know each other in real life and exchange your avatar IDs, you may walk past your friend in pain in Link VRAINS and never notice it.”

Judai shuddered at the thought, which raised him a little in Ryoken’s eyes – it seemed Judai would definitely not be one of those who foolishly threw away real life and connections there for some flimsy VRAINS-made illusion.

“Yeah, no, that’s scary. Anyways, you said you might know who our other traveler is?”

“The day… today was the time we first met, it’d make sense it was him,” Ryoken shrugged, eyeing the crowd in search for red, yellow and green mess of hair (he also kept a watch for tiny, wisteria-colored mop, but so far was unsuccessful in finding either of them). “Besides, if there was one moment that defined us, it was that one.”

“Ooh, I get it – fixed point in time,” Judai nodded as if he understood the importance this day had for Ryoken. “Well then, we better find that friend of yours before he decides he wants to meddle and accidentally destroys both himself and you.”

“Is that him?” Yusei suddenly said, pointing at the dark corner of the nearby alley. Ryoken whirled to it, only to catch a glimpse of colorful hair and black and green bodysuit disappearing into the darkness, so fast it might as well have been an figment of his imagination.

Without saying a word, Ryoken rushed off in its direction, heart beating in staccato. Was this how Yusaku felt for all those years, chasing shadows and hoping the person at the end would be him? Panting and panicking, Ryoken pushed the people away, not even bothering with the excuses as he raced for the alleyway, praying it would be Yusaku – _Playmaker_ , and not just his overactive imagination at work.

_Please, let it be you._

Arriving at the mouth of the alley, Ryoken stopped for a brief moment to catch his breath and for his eyes to adjust to the lower light setting, before freezing. A shadow of a man was climbing the wall of the dead-end, sporting that mess of a hairstyle Ryoken privately always found to be a rather questionable decision for a man that wanted to stay on the down-low in Link VRAINS, and a black and green bodysuit with yellow detailing.

“Playmaker!”

* * *

Yusaku nearly lost his grip in surprise at the call from that familiar voice, speaking his avatar name with such nonchalant ease.

_Revolver? What was he doing here?_

Dropping carefully from the wall and turning around, he spotted the new avatar form Revolver donned after the Hanoi Tower incident – so at least this Revolver will be inclined to treat him as an ally, rather than a nuisance or enemy for not giving Ai over.

_Ai…_ Yusaku’s chest tightened at the reminder of his dearly departed partner. The only person he could honestly say he held feelings for outside of Revolver that weren’t casual acquaintanceship (Zaizen and Shima) or mutual understanding borne of the shared trauma in the past (Takeru and Kusanagi-san). He had no idea what was he doing ten years in the past, but by the looks of it the Lost Incident had already started – Kusanagi Jin, Sugisaki Miyu, two boys Yusaku had once only known as Spectre and Windy’s Origin and Homura Takeru had all been reported missing, and it wouldn’t be long until Yusaku’s younger self would also follow the same route. Was he here to stop the Incident, or…

No, he couldn’t be here to stop it. It had already started, meaning the sixth subject would be obtained one way or another, and Yusaku, for all the terror that Lost Incident brought him, had never regretted meeting Kogami Ryoken. He had regretted what had come afterwards – Cyberse’s destruction, their mutual anger and distrust over Ai’s fate that ended in tragedy anyway – but never the meeting.

“Revolver,” he replied, only then spotting two more men standing just behind him, panting slightly as they had ran up to here.

“Hey, Mr. Other time-traveler,” one of the other men greeted him jovially, if slightly breathlessly. “Changed anything major we should probably know about?”

“No,” Yusaku shook his head. He was very aware how delicate time flow was, and he had no intention of accidentally killing himself. “Who’re you?”

“Yuki Judai and Fudo Yusei, they’re the ones who’ll be taking us back,” Revolver was the one who introduced them, and Yusaku nodded in relief. He had left things unfinished, and he needed to get back to then ASAP.

“Well, after you take care of whatever brought you here in the first place, you mean,” Judai said irreverently, and Yusaku’s eyes snapped to him. What did he mean by that?

“As apparently neither of us brought ourselves here,” Revolver shrugged, “we have to figure out what are we supposed to do to return back.”

_What kind of logic was that?_ Yusaku wondered. Then again, with their track record, nothing was beyond the realm of possibility, and those two did seem like they knew more than them…

“What would that be? It can’t be stopping the Lost Incident,” Yusaku pointed out, and noticed Revolver flinch. _Did I say something I shouldn’t have? But we had talks about Lost Incident before…_ Yusaku pursed his lips and waited for Revolver’s suggestions.

“Enforcing it,” Revolver finally said, head down, and Yusaku had an urge to walk over and slap him into the kingdom come. Had he actually thought Yusaku would be angry at him, after everything they’d gone through together?

_This man is impossible!_

_That’s why you like him, Playmaker-sama,_ Ai-like voice teased him from the back of his mind, and Yusaku swatted it away despite the ball of feelings pressing at the inside of his ribcage. _Be quiet, Ai!_

“That’s the only thing I can think of.”

“Then let’s do it,” Yusaku shrugged and walked over to Revolver, a little surprised the man wasn’t following him. “If that’s the most logical thing to do.”

“And you don’t care you’d have to see yourself off to that place again?” Revolver asked, and Yusaku’s alarms started _howling_. “Willingly aiding in your own terror?”

“I don’t have regrets about our meeting, if that’s what you’re trying to imply,” Yusaku said sharply, because if this went any further, it’d end with a guilt trip Revolver will most likely try to cure by burying himself into coding or by going out and trying to drink his sorrows away under Spectre’s watchful eye (because there was no way in _hell_ Spectre would allow Ryoken to go out alone, and that was the only thing that stopped Yusaku from doing the same thing), so Yusaku had to nip it in the bud. “Let’s go.”

Revolve – _Ryoken_ was still not moving, though, and Yusaku was slowly losing his patience. Revo – _Ryoken_ may be his special person, but that would not save him from getting dragged kicking and screaming into this, because _Yusaku needed to go back home_ , and Ryoken was currently making his life unnecessarily difficult. Fighting on the subjects they had vested interest in, like Ai and Ignis and SOL, was alright – this was just Ryoken digging his heels in and being contrary for the sake of it when they both knew Yusaku was right.

“I have to go back,” Yusaku reminded Revolver, and the other man shook his head.

“I know, but...”

Yusaku’s attention was piqued. It wasn’t like Revolver to be evasive, or to be at loss for words.

“Don’t you realize what I’d doing?” Revolver asked him, lips lifting in a sarcastic smile. “I’ll be doing the exact same thing I did ten years ago, knowing _exactly_ what the outcome will be.”

“And I’ll be helping you do it, knowing exactly how it’ll end for both of us,” Yusaku agreed, starting to see where Revolver was leading him to.

“Wouldn’t it be easier to just… not? Let another child - ”

The rest of the sentence was lost as Yusaku grabbed Revolver by the lapel of his coat, noticing their companions had disappeared somewhere, and placed his gloved hand over Revolver’s mouth.

“If you think I regret us meeting, you’d be _very_ wrong,” Yusaku hissed, for the first time truly angry – angry at Revo – _Ryoken_ for still believing himself to be the chief reason he was hurt, angry at Doctor Kogami for letting Ryoken feel like this, angry at whatever higher force forced them to do this and forbade Yusei and Judai from returning them to their time. “I don’t know what I’d be without Lost Incident, _and I don’t want to know, because I still want to exist as I am right now._ I don’t need another life, I need you to pull your head out of your ass and stop being so guilty all the time when I made peace with you a long time ago!”

He was aware he was speaking out of turn, completely uncharacteristic and out of blue, but this was not something he ever thought he’d have to face, and all his dark thoughts came pouring out. Ryoken looked shocked, trying to take a step back, but Yusaku wouldn’t let him.

“No, listen!” His tongue was still working, and Yusaku had to fight in order to not spill everything. “You will help me get back home, and then we’ll deal with this, _properly._ No more waits. Do you hear me, _Ryoken?_ ”

“Yes, _Yusaku,_ ” Ryoken murmured, eyes wide and body shaky as Yusaku let him go.

“Good.” With that being said, Yusaku led them to the street where the two met first and sat on the nearby bench, waiting for the history to repeat again.

* * *

“Did you have to lie to them like that, Judai?” Yusei murmured, checking his D-Wheel’s stats.

“Sure did,” Judai nodded from where he was lounging on the D-Wheel’s seat. “We could’ve gotten them back, but that’d defeat the point of Fate placing them here – and if she got that pissed at them about their unsolved issues, I’d rather not get in her way.”

“Even if that way obviously includes her being a rabid shipper and getting to see her new favorite couple get together?” Yusei raised an eyebrow.

“Yusei, you don’t get it,” Judai laughed. “Seriously, you have to meet her one day – she’s just like you and I, a normal human who got saddled with way too much power - so yes, that includes her playing a matchmaker for her new favorites. I’m just glad she moved on from the two of us.”

“I’m also glad,” Yusei nodded, shuddering at the thought.

No, he did not need another one of her matchmaking schemes to involve him again, thank you very much!


End file.
